Other inhabitants of Scadrial?

[Chlehrma]

I just finished rereading the series again and noticed something I had not before. When Vin held the power from the well of ascension she noticed that most of the world was uninhabitable except at the poles. Does anyone know if Sanderson has commented about this? Will there be a story covering those who lived at the pole opposite the one Where Vin and the crew resided?

[bartbug he/him]

I believe that there are several words of brandon about this. I don't have quotes right now, but there is something in the annotations on his website, and the general gist of what we know is that they somehow have 'mechanical' metallic arts, and they were not physically altered by Rashek. I think that's it.

 

Though if someone were to correct me, I would be very happy.

[Shardlet he/him]

That is about the gist of it, bartbug.  By way of clarification, the southern inhabitants use the metallic arts in a mechanical fashion (to me there is a subtle difference).  The Lord Ruler (TLR) left these folks unchanged as a genetic reserve of sorts and they survived Vin's bumbling attempts to shift the planet.  If I am not mistaken, we'll be learning about these people in the next Mistborn trilogy.

[Mailliw73 he/him]

This is a question I had Miyabi ask Brandon when he sat and interviewed him. I think it's the most we know about whether or not they'll have a series.

Miyabi: Will ‘Southern Scadrians have their own series? Or will they just be something mentioned in the next mistborn trilogies? Does anything major take place…

Brandon: We will have to see. Originally they did not have a series but it will depend on how much time I spend deviating with interesting side-stories before I jump up into the second trilogy. Because by the second trilogy, this has all been discovered and its a different world. I have loosely plotted a smaller series visiting the southern continent.

Edited November 30, 2013 by Ookla the Stormblessed

[Swimmingly he/him]

This is a question I had Miyabi ask Brandon when he sat and interviewed him. I think it's the most we know about whether or not they'll have a series.

 

So I suppose that we might have a novella or two, or possibly a Wax & Wayne style serial series?

[Aether he/him]

They did already hint at clashes with the Southerners in The Elendel broad-sheet. So I presume it will be around Wax & Wayne's time that they make contact. That is not to say that this will happen during these books, but around that era at least.

[Edgedancer he/him]

They did already hint at clashes with the Southerners in The Elendel broad-sheet. So I presume it will be around Wax & Wayne's time that they make contact. That is not to say that this will happen during these books, but around that era at least.

Given that the Wax & Wayne books seem to play in what is pretty much the fantasy Wild West time I hope that the Southerners don´t suffer the same fate as the native Americans.

[Aether he/him]

Judging by the story from The Elendel article, it sounds like it just might be the other way around.

Edited December 1, 2013 by Aether

[Swimmingly he/him]

I wouldn't mind a Southerner viewpoint character sometime

[bartbug he/him]

10 bucks says that in a conflict, the 'chosen of Harmony' will win. The fact that they have a god that will lean towards their side combine with the greater amounts of Investiture in their system gives the Elendians the clear advantage.

(Off topic, but am I the only one who finds it incredibly ironic that at first, Elend was barely a side character and now, history views him as the second most important person, ever (with Sazed being the first)).

[Swimmingly he/him]

10 bucks says that in a conflict, the 'chosen of Harmony' will win. The fact that they have a god that will lean towards their side combine with the greater amounts of Investiture in their system gives the Elendians the clear advantage.

(Off topic, but am I the only one who finds it incredibly ironic that at first, Elend was barely a side character and now, history views him as the second most important person, ever (with Sazed being the first)).

Sazed is the god of all of Scadrial. He will probably steer the conflict in such a way as it ends with either a truce and the free exchange of ideas, or a mostly benevolent "roman empire" style conquest by one side or another that leaves a small outsider upper "government" class, with the power structure beneath them mostly intact. 

[Shardlet he/him]

Sazed has shown that he does not like to deal with a heavy hand.  He apparently seeks to not limit the choices that people make.  He really only seems so far to exercise minor tweaks to assist an outcome.  He even doesn't want to strongly direct his followers.

[Swimmingly he/him]

Sazed has shown that he does not like to deal with a heavy hand.  He apparently seeks to not limit the choices that people make.  He really only seems so far to exercise minor tweaks to assist an outcome.  He even doesn't want to strongly direct his followers.

I could see him making a bunch of "minor tweaks" to prevent a full scale war and destruction of the genetic heritage of the North.

[Aether he/him]

Am I the only one who wants to see a full scale war? Come on! Allomantic warfare!

[Swimmingly he/him]

Or, you know, conventional warfare except one side has Allomantic cannons and the other has koloss and pewterarm infantry with coinshot shock troops/snipers etc. Essentially, superior weapons vs. superior soldiers... and we know how that all ends eventually

[Aether he/him]

Yeah. It ends awesomely!

[Swimmingly he/him]

When I say we know how that ends, I was referring to the fact that superior weaponry tends to dominate given time, though guerrilla tactics ccan help prolong it

[Oudeis he/him]

When I say we know how that ends, I was referring to the fact that superior weaponry tends to dominate given time, though guerrilla tactics ccan help prolong it

 

Except that all it takes is one super-soldier task force to sneak to the other side and steal plans. It'd be a lot harder to sneak up north and steal yourself some allomancy... unless you use hemalurgy, of course.

 

BTW, I don't know a lot of military history. based on what do you say that superior weaponry overcomes genetically enhanced super-troops?

Edited December 2, 2013 by Ookla the Confuzified

[Aether he/him]

I love the twist this discussion took.

 

And I do believe BOTH sides would have super-soldiers. Arguably, the south wouldn't have feruchemists, but they would have allomancers.

[Oudeis he/him]

I love the twist this discussion took.

 

And I do believe BOTH sides would have super-soldiers. Arguably, the south wouldn't have feruchemists, but they would have allomancers.

 

Yes... but Alendi-style allomancers. A fraction of the power of allomancers descended from the lerasium Mistborn. Lestibournes' descendants in particular should be rather powerful.

[Swimmingly he/him]

Not everybody is an allomancer in the north

 

But a fleet of mechallomantic cannons flinging explosives on ships powered by mechallomantic engines, with everybody able to operate mechallomantic small arms and body armour, is going to have a significant advantage over a motley of coinshots, lurchers, thugs, koloss, kandra, rioters, soothers, copperclouds, seekers, ferrings, people able to warp time.... actually never mind what I just said. The law of Narrative Causality states that any group that contains protagonists and can be defined as "motley" has a 90% chance of winning a war, with increased probabilities if they are defending their homes, have nominal heavenly assistance, and the bad guys have a record of pillage-and-burniness.

[name_here]

Well, the advantage of superior weaponry over superior soldiers is that the weaponry can keep getting better until it's good enough to trump the soldiers. However, it's a lot easier to improve your weaponry than to improve your soldiers. Also, making weapons that trump Allomancy is a bit of a tricky proposition. The best materials for nearly everything you need from a weapon are non-aluminum metals, and using those against coinshots is a good way to die. Time bubbles are also pretty hard to handle, and if the Pits are back in operation and Seers can be obtained, they'd be a real problem.

 

The big advantage the Southerners would have is that everyone can use a gun, while Allomancers with useful combat powers are in rather limited supply.

 

I wouldn't expect Harmony to intervene, not his style. Marsh, on the other hand, might very well take a more proactive approach and is basically invincible.

Edited December 2, 2013 by name_here

[Aether he/him]

Ah! Point! Do we know if Sazed did any tinkering with them at all?

[Swimmingly he/him]

Well, the advantage of superior weaponry over superior soldiers is that the weaponry can keep getting better until it's good enough to trump the soldiers. However, it's a lot easier to improve your weaponry than to improve your soldiers. Also, making weapons that trump Allomancy is a bit of a tricky proposition. The best materials for nearly everything you need from a weapon are non-aluminum metals, and using those against coinshots is a good way to die. Time bubbles are also pretty hard to handle, and if the Pits are back in operation and Seers can be obtained, they'd be a real problem.

 

The big advantage the Southerners would have is that everyone can use a gun, while Allomancers with useful combat powers are in rather limited supply.

 

I wouldn't expect Harmony to intervene, not his style. Marsh, on the other hand, might very well take a more proactive approach and is basically invincible.

By proactive, I assume you mean "fly into the midst of the enemy by night, descending with gleaming iron eyes and shining knives to soak the earth in Southern blood like a grim and terrible angel of death"?

[Swimmingly he/him]

Well, the advantage of superior weaponry over superior soldiers is that the weaponry can keep getting better until it's good enough to trump the soldiers. However, it's a lot easier to improve your weaponry than to improve your soldiers. Also, making weapons that trump Allomancy is a bit of a tricky proposition. The best materials for nearly everything you need from a weapon are non-aluminum metals, and using those against coinshots is a good way to die. Time bubbles are also pretty hard to handle, and if the Pits are back in operation and Seers can be obtained, they'd be a real problem.

 

The big advantage the Southerners would have is that everyone can use a gun, while Allomancers with useful combat powers are in rather limited supply.

 

I wouldn't expect Harmony to intervene, not his style. Marsh, on the other hand, might very well take a more proactive approach and is basically invincible.

Also, big artillery would knock out any advantage the enemy might have. A Crasher like Wax might be able to deflect a big, fast shell and a double Iron user might be able to change it's course. A Pulser could sacrifice themselves if they started the bubble at exactly the right time to give everyone else a chance to escape. A full feruchemist could block the explosive while tapping iron, gold, and pewter and maybe survive. Using trained, anchored coinshots, you might be able to trigger the things in midair, or shove them away at the cost of the coinshot's life - perhaps a Feruchemical gold Allomantic iron user could survive. If the explosives have metal triggering mechanisms, a lurcher or coinshot might even be able to set them off directly. Generally, though, the simple speed, mass, and momentum of an artillery shell would be extremely costly to life, feruchemical Investiture, or both to negate, while presumably costing the shooters nothing.